I. Field
The following description relates generally to wireless communications, and more particularly to optional reading of Qoffset parameter, in detected cells by user equipment (UE) and processing of the Qoffset parameter.
II. Background
Wireless communication systems are widely deployed to provide various types of communication; for instance, voice and/or data, can be provided via such wireless communication systems. A typical wireless communication system, or network, can provide multiple users access to one or more shared resources (e.g., bandwidth, transmit power, . . . ). For instance, a system can use a variety of multiple access techniques such as Frequency Division Multiplexing (FDM), Time Division Multiplexing (TDM), Code Division Multiplexing (CDM), Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) Long-Term Evolution (LTE) systems, Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM), and others.
Generally, wireless multiple-access communication systems can simultaneously support communication for multiple mobile devices. Each mobile device can communicate with one or more base stations via transmissions on forward and reverse links. The forward link (or downlink) refers to the communication link from base stations to mobile devices, and the reverse link (or uplink) refers to the communication link from mobile devices to base stations. This communication link can be established via a single-in-single-out, multiple-in-signal-out, or a multiple-in-multiple-out (MIMO) system.
For instance, a MIMO system can employ multiple (NT) transmit antennas and multiple (NR) receive antennas for data transmission. A MIMO channel formed, by the NT transmit and NR receive antennas can be decomposed into Ns independent channels, which are also referred to as spatial channels, where NS≦min{NT, NR}. Each of the NS independent channels can correspond to a dimension. The MIMO system can provide improved performance (e.g., higher throughput and/or greater reliability) if the additional dimensionalities created by the multiple transmit and receive antennas are utilized.
A MIMO system can support a time division duplex (TDD) and frequency division duplex (FDD) systems. In a TDD system, the forward and reverse link transmissions can be on the same frequency region so that the reciprocity principle allows the estimation of the forward, link channel from the reverse link channel. This can enable the access point to extract transmit beamforming gain on the forward link when multiple antennas are available at the access point
Wireless communication systems oftentimes employ one or more base stations that provide a coverage area. A typical base station can transmit multiple data streams for broadcast, multicast and/or unicast services, wherein a data stream may be a stream of data that can be of independent reception interest to a mobile device. A mobile device within the coverage area of such base station can be employed to receive one, more than one, or all the data streams carried by the composite stream. Likewise, a mobile device can transmit data to the base station or another mobile device.
Typically, a mobile device can monitor and measure signal strengths of cells near the mobile device, and report the signal strengths to a base station serving the mobile device, to facilitate determining whether a particular neighboring cell has a signal strength that is stronger than the serving cell and whether a handover of the mobile device from the serving cell to a neighbor cell should be performed. With regard to signal strength of a cell, a cell can be associated with an offset value (e.g., Qoffset) that can be added to the measured signal strength in order to compensate for phenomena that affect the value of the measured signal strength to facilitate more accurate measurement of signal strength. Conventionally, for instance, with regard to Universal Mobile Telecommunication System (UMTS), the offset value is included as a parameter in a neighbor cell list that contains information regarding neighbor cells and is maintained by the serving base station. However, neighbor cells may not always be on the neighbor cell list transmitted in the serving cell, and as a result, information, such as the offset, of an unknown neighbor cell is not known to the serving base station. Consequently, the measured signal strength of the unknown neighbor cell cannot be normalized or adjusted (e.g., compensated) without the appropriate offset value. It is desirable to efficiently detect and read parameters, such as offset values, of cells (e.g., previously unknown neighbor cells). It is also desirable to enable flexibility by mobile devices with regard to reporting of parameter values (e.g., Qoffset) associated with cells, such as neighbor cells.